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the courage to advocate for herself. I didn’t know whether Teddy and Chiaka
had even noticed. I was quick to claim my trophy, though, heading home that
afternoon with my head up and one of those gold-foil stars stuck on my shirt.

t home, I lived in a world of high drama and intrigue, immersing myself in
an ever-evolving soap opera of dolls. There were births, feuds, and betrayals.
There was hope, hatred, and sometimes sex. My preferred way to pass the time
between school and dinner was to park myself in the common area outside my
room and Craig’s and spread my Barbies across the floor, spinning out scenarios
that felt as real to me as life itself, sometimes inserting Craig’s G.I. Joe action
figures into the plotlines. I kept my dolls’ outfits in a child-sized vinyl suitcase
covered in a floral print. I assigned every Barbie and every G.I. Joe a personality.
I also recruited into service the worn-out alphabet blocks my mother had used
years earlier to teach us our letters. They, too, were given names and inner lives.

I rarely chose to join the neighborhood kids who played outside after
school, nor did I invite school friends home with me, in part because I was a
fastidious kid and didn’t want anyone meddling with my dolls. I’d been to other
girls’ houses and seen the horror-show scenarios—Barbies whose hair had been
hacked off or whose faces had been crosshatched with Magic Marker. And one
thing I was learning at school was that kid dynamics could be messy. Whatever
sweet scenes you might witness on a playground, beneath them lay a tyranny of
shifting hierarchies and alliances. There were queen bees, bullies, and followers. I
wasn’t shy, but I also wasn’t sure I needed any of that messiness in my life outside
school. Instead, I sank my energy into being the sole animating force in my little
common-area universe. If Craig showed up and had the audacity to move a
single block, I’d start shrieking. I was also not above hitting him when necessary
—usually a direct fist blow to the middle of his back. The point was that the dolls
and blocks needed me to give them life, and I dutifully gave it to them, imposing
one personal crisis after another. Like any good deity, I was there to see them
suffer and grow.

Meanwhile, from my bedroom window, I could observe most of the real-
world happenings on our block of Euclid Avenue. In the late afternoons, I’d see
Mr. Thompson, the tall African American man who owned the three-unit
building across the street, loading his big bass guitar into the back of his Cadillac,
setting off for a gig in one jazz club or another. I’d watch the Mendozas, the